Infinite Reflections
by Timesprite
Summary: A series of short drabbles based on prompts.
1. Fire

**Disclaimer:** GetBackers doesn't belong to me, obviously. No profit is being made from the use of these characters. 

**A/N:** Yeah, so... these are all going to be short little things based on prompts. Probably with a mix of manga and anime continuity (including a mix of terminology, because at this point I've read offical translations and scanlations, and seen the show subbed and dubbed, and I can't keep it all straight anymore.)

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**Fire**

When he thinks of Kazuki, Juubei cannot help but think of him as two people--Kazuki before the fire, and after. Because though traces of the former remain in the latter, they are not the same people.

The fire burned him from the inside out, he thinks, the embers glowing for years aftterward, leaving the man he cherishes more than his own life hollow, a brittle shell. Where once there had been innocence and joy, there was now flame, flickering behind those seemingly serene brown eyes. He cannot know the younger man's pain. Juubei has his sister. He did not watch his parents die, and the one thing most precious to him survived the flames, though not unchanged.

Mugenjou made Kazuki strong, though it left him empty. The Fortress forged him into something quiet and terrifying all at once, and Juubei thinks that had he not known him before, he might have feared his friend. It took Raitei to draw out the damaged parts, pull all that scar tissue to the surface and elicit wounded smiles from the Thread Master. But it wasn't a cure, just an inversion. The hard, unfeeling parts are buried deep.

He knows, could he look into those eyes now, that he would not see fire. Somehow, it's not the comforting thought it should be.


	2. Lovers

Disclaimer: GetBackers doesn't belong to me, obviously. No profit is being made from the use of these characters.

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**Lovers**

It's a poorly kept secret that Kazuki humors his protectors. For all their strength, their emotions are fragile things, and Kazuki strives to keep them happy. He has learned to bear their reverance with grace, though he does not think himself the prince they so adore. He is a man, like any other, and he has not earned their devotion.

Still, he loves them. Loves Juubei's silence, his ability to believe--absolutely--in something the way Kazuki never can. He loves Toshiki's brash nature, the firey temperment that hides a wounded soul. He loves them and so accepts the roles they have chosen. They, the protectors, he, their reveared lord.

But on cold nights in Mugenjou, it's not their reverence he cherishes, curled between them safe and warm and adored, it's the serenity they give him by virtue of their love.


	3. Worry

**Disclaimer:** GetBackers doesn't belong to me, obviously. No profit is being made from the use of these characters.

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**Worry**

No one ever worried about Emishi, least of all Shido.

There were things to worry about, of course, things outside of finding enough food for everyone, or the monsters from the Beltline. There was Raitei, of course. He was power--power incarnate, power that made the hair on the back of his neck stand on end every time he got near the man--but unstable. His anger as easily unleashed at allies as it was enemies in the heat of the moment. And there was Kazuki, all that quiet strength, the calm facade with danger roiling underneath, danger that showed in protracted silences and the unspoken knowledge that he might simply walk away into the Beltline again, never to return. But questioning Raitei was unthinkable, and Kazuki was Juubei's to worry about, so Shido didn't worry about much at all, really, certainly not the wisecracker a level or two below the Kings in status, who was kept around because he was entertaining--though not funny--and was a good fighter.

Even after the Volts broke up, and Shido left the fortress, he didn't worry. Out of all of them, Emishi was the one with--if not family, than personal ties, at least--people who needed and depended on him. He wasn't adrift, not like the rest of them.

So no one ever spared a stray thought for the man, because he smiled and joked. He was happy.

But as Shido watches Haruki Emishi wander back into MakubeX's headquarters, whistling cheerfully to himself, covered head to toe in someone else's blood, he thinks, just maybe, someone should have.


End file.
